Sarajevo Film Festival and Mostar premiere

17th  – Day 1

My dear friend Lalla and I are ready to drive from Turin to Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina. 1240 km of driving. But first, a quick stop at Milano Malpensa Airport. My dear friend Svjetlana, the main character of my first film “PRIVATE FRAGMENTS OF BOSNIA” and the reason why I was infected by a deep love for Mostar, is coming from Santa Monica (USA). We haven’t seen each other for 8 years and the screening of MOSTAR UNITED at the Sarajevo Film Festival seems a perfect event for a family reunion. It will be a gorgeous week.

After 8 hours of heavy talking and driving, we’re tired. -”Where should we stop for the night?”. Anywhere. The smallest is the place on the map, the happiest Lalla will be.  Let’s stop here. Hard to find something smaller than this village. Somewhere close to Zagreb. One pub, one bar, Wilma’s grill, one hotel. The toilet is outside the room. Lalla is even more happy.

-”What should we eat”?

Wilma’s grill is almost to close, but they can cook some cevapcici (5 or 7 small sausages in a big pita bread) for us and serve some beers. Great. The waiter is friendly.

-“How long do you think it takes to go from here to Sarajevo?”, I ask him.
-“Walking or driving?”
It seemed a very cheap joke to me, but I accepted to play the game – “Walking”
-“2 days”
-“Ok. And driving?”
- “6 hours”
The cevapcici was just gorgeous. Wilma’s closed, but the waiter was still around.
“Excuse me, madame, why did you ask me how long it takes to walk from here to Sarajevo?”
“I didn’t. You asked me if I wanted to walk or drive. I thought you were joking, so I joked, too”
“I wasn’t”
My feeling was to be trapped in a surrealistic situation. I still don’t have a clue.

18th – Day 2

Early morning. Ready to leave. “Not without having breakfast”, the host smiles. She serves us 3 big portions of Burek (a sort of meat pie), while we were dreaming of a sweet croissant. “It’s the same I ate yesterday!” says Lalla, who is not vegetarian, but not used to eat so much meat. “No my dear, this is something different. You’ll got used”.  Croatia is already behind us and Bosnia welcomes us with the cyrillic signs of Srpska Republic. Few hours of driving and we arrive in Sarajevo, finally. It’s sunny and hot and we can’t believe the VIP treatment the Festival gives us. We are in a 5 star hotel with swimming pool and fitness centre. We can’t but feel pure joy and gratefulness.

After collecting the tickets for Mostar Unted’s screening, we visit the Festival and say hi to Saso and Vedrana, going from a kafana to the next one.

19th- THE DAY

Sarajevo is more and more beautiful. During these last 5 years it has changed a lot. It’s life what you breath in the streets. Life and creativity. And the SFF is just the celebration of this fantastic atmoshere. But I am shaking. Tonight is Mostar United’s night. We close the festival in prime time. Great honor, happiness and fear. Fear to be perceived as a stranger who tells the umpteenth story about this gorgeous country, fear to hurt somebody, fear to disappoint my friends who came from LA, Norway, Mostar, Italy or anywhere else to share this unique event in my life. The water of the swimming pool is warm. It’s nice to swim slowly and now my “bullet list” is ok. Lalla is patiently listening to me, while Svjetlana is somewhere getting some massage to adjust to the European time zone. Before going to the screening I am invited to a dinner. My producer and I enter the place and sit with the guests. One glass of water, then one more. Some guests are not arrived, yet and the dinner cannot start. The Berlinale is  sitting on my right side, a bulgarian director on my left side. One more glass of water and we have to leave. For sure the dinner would be great, but we are late.

Let’s check the film. The technician is from Mostar. “I can’t wait to see the film. You worked with Neso, didn’t you?” “Yes, of course!”. There’s a long queue. The tickets are sold out. There’s a nice surprise: the italian journalist Luciana Castellina is queueing, too. Everybody seems to be here tonight.  The theatre is full, people sit on the stairs, it’s hot and the AC is not working. Svjetlana and Lalla are sitting in the back. Saso, Vedrana and Adi are right behind me. My heart beats faster and faster. The lights are off, the film begins. Vedrana laughes a lot during the film and this is calming me down. Watching the film here is like watching a brand new film. Nothing to do with the screenings in Amsterdam or Trieste. Every audience is completely different. Finally the film is over. An incredibile, unexpected, neverending applause lasts for  the duration of the credits and many minutes more. I am almost to cry. I watch my friends. On their face I can read many different emotions, from happiness to grief, from pride to pain, from love to question marks. I still don’t know what was going on in my mind. Taking pictures to the audience from the stage was the only thing I could do. I wanted to remember it forever. And ever.

Then the Q&A. Rada Sesic is a fantastic mediator. “Why didn’t you go to the “western side” during the film?”. This question from the audience was the toughest one. It’s was a dramaturgic choice, not a political one. The film is a father – son story and the camera goes where they go. Twice they went to the “other” side and twice we went with them. Mostar United is not a journalistic reportage or a political essay. If somebody will make that film, I will be glad to watch it. I’m still not sure I was clear enough.

20th – THE D-DAY

The way from Sarajevo to Mostar is short but very slow. Tonight there’s the Mostar premiere of the film and I am even more nervous than yesterday. The Club of Veterans where we will screen the film is just fantastic. 200 seats outdoor, 2 bars, the refridgerators are full of beers, the nearby Neretva is refreshing the atmosphere. We need some darkness to check the projector.

Let’s look for Mensud and see if he comes tonight. He’s in his sport suit, just back from the training. He’s not coming to the Premiere.  I understand him. He warns me that in the film there are some seconds that might offend people who are believers. In some minute Ramadan will begin and it could be not respectful to hear those few words just tonight. This is a precious tip. I ran to my friends. The film is almost to begin, but we have to do something. Thank God we have a remote control. I sit under the table in front of the screen, holding the remote in my hands and waiting to mute those disrespectful words. Nobody will notice the short lack of sound. Dzenan, the co-protagonist, is amongst the audience. A journalist would love to talk to me, but Adi keeps her far from me. The situation is very delicate, I could miss the sentence to mute. “Sorry, madame, but Claudia can’t move. You see, she’s a very sensitive and artistic soul and when the film begins, she needs to find a special place and isolate from everybody”.  I guess she was very impressed how artistic soul I was, sitting alone under the table. Saso, Vedrana and Adi are breathless, crossing fingers, smoking nervously. The mute operation works, we honored God and Ramadan and I can finally enjoy the screening.

500 people are in the Club’s court yard. Kids, teenagers, retired people, whole families and dogs are there. It’s like sitting in somebody’s living room watching a family movie. My heart runs fast, my friends are breathless. We look around to check reactions. They laugh, they keep silent, they just don’t miss one frame.

It’s incredibile beauty what I am experiencing. The warm applause at the end is followed by murmurs. How come is Velez winning only one match? We actually expected much more critical reviews from the audience, but Mostarians liked the film. Maybe there is too much of this and not enough of that, but it was a success. And I am incredibly happy. Dzenan is happy, too, except that now everybody is calling him “Brad Pitt”. “I don’t have idols!”, he says. Nice to see what a beautiful grown up man he is now, so mature and responsible. I am really glad to see him here with his shiny smile. But he has to go home because it’s late and tomorrow he has the training.  People leave and only the veterans, Lalla, Svjetlana and I sit in the court yard. Sasa brings us a gorgeous grilled Blizva. “What part of the cow is this?”. “It’s better not to know. Just eat it!”. Blizva, beers, nice talks until late. The air is fresh, we could stay forever. Finally the journalist got me. She pushes the rec botton and ask the first question “Is this your first time here in Mostar?”. This is already a joke in Mostar.

21st – DAY 5

Just a perfect day to go to Buna river and eat trouts, sitting under the trees, refreshing ourselves, enjoying the company of Svjetlana’s father. The water is cold and my feet are freezing. Ducks are seducing us hoping to get some food. What a wonderful spot, quiet and silent. We break the silence with hours of talking about the trip, about Sarajevo and the last events in our lives. Life can be so light and delightful if you look at it from this little island in the middle of Buna. Problems can’t reach us. Only beauty, love and sharing.

22nd – DAY 6

It’s time to leave Mostar and go back home. We can’t go without eating breakfast with Saso and Vedrana. Who knows when we will meet again. They will go back to Norway soon. I hate “goodbyes”. So we’d better talk about the next time we’ll meet and next  projects. But I can’t blow away the “goodbye” feeling. Goodbye. There’s time for the last kiss to a common friend who did not come to the screenings. Goodbye, my friend. Then, Svjetlana’s father takes us for lunch to spend some extra time together. The best lamb I ever ate.
3 pm. Let’s leave. Goodbye. Let’s go to the highway. No, let’s drive through the villages, the landscape is so beautiful. The border. The officier, reading a newspaper, is looking at me. I stop and show him the passports. He doesn’t move and makes no expression. The passports are in my hand. I look at him, I look at Svjetlana. Nobody says anything. Can we pass the border? Should we stay? She answers to me in bosnian. She fogot we speak different languages. I look at the officier, then at Svjetlana. Lalla is looking at the 3 of us from the back. It’s a surrealistic scene like the conversation about walking from Zagreb to Sarajevo. What am I supposed to do now? The officier is still looking at me, holding the newspaper. “What does she want from me?” asks he to Svjetlana, a little pissed off. The newspaper was for sure more interesting than our passports. Next time, something like: “you can go” would be of some help, in my opinion.
Let’s stop to sleep. Yes, in a while. Where? We’re lost somewhere in Slovenja. An old castle is on the top of a mountain. Thunders and lightnings are scary, but Lalla and Svjetlana have great time. I am almost sleepy. It’s 10 pm. Let’s stop to sleep. Where?, here? there’s nothing! Ok, let’s see, in a while. After 12 hours of driving, talking and deejaying, mixing old music to old memories, we finally stopped for the night, at my flat, in Italy.

23rd – DAY 7

Lazy like a sunday morning. My town is like a desert. I take Svjetlana around and nobody is there. The third square of Italy is empty, while the heat in unbereable. Sitting on my sofa, drinking a cup of tea and reading Il Manifesto, I have a thrill. There’s my name on the second page. Mrs Castellina is writing about the Sarajevo Film Festival and Mostar United. 3 lines, but they are enough to have a thrill.
Gnocco fritto for dinner. I am at home. Our Thelma and Louise and Louise trip is over.

4th – DAY 8

Carpi- Milano Malpensa Airport. Svjetlana leaves. Goodbye. See you soon. We won’t wait 8 years, next time. Let’s have some continuity. Milano – Reggio Emilia. Lalla steps down. Her little doggy is there, waiting for her. Goodbye. Reggio Emilia-Carpi. Back home. Time runs too fast. Something unforgettable has happened to us. We have been in our twenties once again.